Psuedo Medieval fantasy world

[Dr_emperor]

Reason for this setting: Published settings are very long and my players don’t really read them. This could be great if you didn’t have to remind them of things. So I asked my players what they wanted and they said medieval fantasy. My group thinks alignments dumb, we didn’t want grimdark and D&D is unbalanced past a certain point. On further investigation medieval fantasy meant very different things to different players. So if we just guess there assumptions are true the players will just disagree with each other. So this is a shot at a pseudo medieval fantasy 3.5 3-12 level.
My goal is to couple a few distinct power groups that are leading the weak with some vague races to create a world where players can have a general idea what is going on without having to read a novel. Each of the power groups will have a religion that should be similar to a philosophy. Almost all have a benefactor that holds the scary monsters at bay.

Mages (term): Magic to the common man is an unexplainable force and they don’t like mages. Now with magic in D&D having so many different types most of the peasants can’t really define what they dislike about magic. They are completely fine with the cleric that they have known there entire life but fear any outsider using spells against them. Pretty much Mage is a dire insult for each of the power groups to label each other and anyone who goes against them.
Celestials:
Mechanical info: (in the fiend folio is a Deva Movanic CR 9 they have create food and water at will caster level 9 which supplies 27 people per casting X 10 for casting each round in a minute X180 so that’s roughly 50,000 people fed from 3 hours of work from a Celestial. I happen to think three hours of work is reasonable from the high being inside a metropolis. )
Philosophy: Platonic, or at least his forms leading to a definable “Good.” The celestials are timeless entities that have come to the material to proclaim this good unto the people. Different Celestials have differing amounts of direct role in governance, some seem to be a figurehead for their priesthood others are more direct.
Who are they: The Celestials say they are the Lesser spirits of Justice, hope, etc. Men are Dualistic beings whose souls journey between the worlds. They say that Man became corrupt and began using their souls to wreak havoc on themselves and others. Thus the Celestials did come down in order to show man the true way to live.
Architecture: Gothic, with truly massive walls to protect the outside of the city, each city should have walls big enough that a colossal tall creature would at best be standing at face level to the people on the walls of the city.
Organization: The celestials have warded off their charges away from the rest of the world behind giant walls. The people are easily kept protected by their lords. Each day consists of a massive undertaking of making sure that everyone in the city is fed. The Deva is centrally located within the city and the priesthood within the city attends to this task of moving the food outward. The city is divided up into several guilds, and each priest attends is assigned to a guild. The priests act as religious advisors and leaders to each part of the community.
The guilds are nominally without rank. However, the accountants and record keepers are more centrally located within the city and much friendlier with the priests. Any guild with duties that include leaving the cities gates is automatically given to distrust by the populace. This includes the woodcutting guild, some quarries and some miners. The city exists to feed this populace where all food and water is taken care of trade still occurs as a necessary evil for items not producible in a city(metals, lumber). Some cities that are particularly needy produce luxury items for export. Traders spread rumors of some massive cities that don’t have gates to enter, and rarely do they speak of cities completely domed off from the outside world.
Each child is chosen by the priests at the age of 8(match for race), to become a journey man of a guild or an acolyte of the priests. Most are selected to join their parent’s profession, and are trained by a friend of that family. At the age of 14 children are trained in the use of a weapon, and tasked with several guard duties, except for the acolytes. At the age of 20 they fully enter their guild or they may stay on as full time soldiers. Guilds additionally to their profession are assigned duties and times on the walls. Professional soldiers man the gates and towers.
Architecture: Gothic, with truly massive walls to protect the outside of the city, each city should have walls big enough that a colossal tall creature would at best be standing at face level to the people on the walls of the city.
Diet: Mana and water
Leisure: Each city celebrates its founding as well as the coming of the Morningstar as great holidays, additionally plays and sporting events take place. The guilds all have their own football team(oldschool helmetless no forward pass stuff, traditionally violent games as clerics are available to heal).

Deimos (The houses of Tanari, and Baaetzu may seem very different but they are of the same race. Humans come in many different colors, and Tanari seem to come in more shapes and colors should we be surprised that as creatures of such power that it expresses itself in different ways. The Baaetzu are more humanlike. They say that they changed their form as much as was possible in order to fit into our societies.)
Philosophy: Epicureanism, the Deimos believe that one should build communities. That one should seek out the pleasures in life and the highest pleasures are intellectual pursuits with friends. They say that after death comes Nirvanna but the Mages/celestials are separating people so that they can control their souls for power and immortality in this world rather than bliss in the next.
Who are they: The Deimos are a group of wanderers from far away. They came into conflict with powerful mages from this region and are here to help with the suffering they are causing here.
Organization: The Deimos rule varies by family. The Tanari rule as kings. The Baaetzue decide policies as they relate to outsiders but stand as advisors to a domestic council or lord. Both set up in a kind of feudalism, each deimos answers to a higher Deimos in the region. Each Deimos keeps a small personal cadre of knights. These knights together are to know every person on the Deimos lands. It is not uncommon for the Deimos to tour his own lands, or to help out farmers. Each set of homesteads is arranged around the larger temple/fort and each has a specific message to send word of danger upward to their protector.
Architecture: ancient Hindi or Aztec
Diet: Fish and grown food, animals are used for farming not for food.
Leisure: Life isn’t as easy in The Deimos lands and there is less time for leisure but celebratory days are common with large festivals for harvest and after planting.

Giants
Philosophy: Kant, the giants believe in a universal law. They believe an action can be analyzed and determined if it has merit by what would happen if one were to take that action all the time. So lying is bad because if everyone were to lie all the time society wouldn’t function. This is perpetuated as a kind of honor which is very important to the giants. They assume that all giants function under honor but other races do not.
Organization: Giants are still organized into tribal structures. Most of those tribes control several towns villages and hamlets of humans. These groups are taxed for the protection of their tribe. The giants make very few changes to man’s rules. The major changes are any idols are to be made with giant proportions, taxes are paid, and lying or harming a giant are punishable by death. Giants are known for taking some servants from their tributes. It is not uncommon for them to see merit in one of there servants and to help that human into a role of power over there old society.
Architecture: Nomadic equipment
Diet: mainly meat, and foodstuffs from tributes
Leisure: Hunting, also stuff giants are described as doing in the Monster Manuals that doesn’t contradict honor

Druids
Philosophy: Aristotle’s philosophy of moderation.
Organization: Not all druids rule directly. The druids act as head arbiter of disputes. They enforce rules on their populations in order to get them to react in moderation. The oldest of the druids has the most say. Druids are able to feed the populace with good berries and plant growth. Powerful Druids can extend there power base through awakening powerful animals or trees, or reincarnating into younger bodies.
Architecture: Druid villages tend to blend in to their surroundings
Diet: Balanced

Heroics
Philosophy: Heroics believe that the world is a chaotic place and that humans don’t have control about it. Thus they believe that each person must strive to do their best. In effect Heroics teach people to strive for greatness in whatever they do.
Organization: Mostly each kingdom ends up being ruled by Heroes who protect the populace. These people generally rule as Nobility. Heroic civilizations are known for crumbling after a few generations as no one is strong enough to curtail the constant influx of monsters threatening human civilizations (totally not celestials, deimos, giants conquering there rivals). It is not uncommon for Heroics to try to cheat death through great projects involving magic, or at least thats the rumor.
Architecture: Old architecture from ancient Greece, Rome, and Persia
Diet: by climate

Races: each race is listed along its old paganism and one of the seven sins as the stereotype of the races vice.
Humans: Lustful idolaters humans worshiped almost everything.
Mishtai(2 races in magic of incarnum and spellscales races of dragon): Pride, the Mishtai believed that they were the only souled race and were here to teach to the other races. (note three races as the mishtai have fractured most hate the other factions there was definitely an old war between them)
Goblins: Sloth, fair folk
Dwarves: Greedy from the bones of the earth
Kobolds: Envy, dragon worshipers
Shifters: Wrathful, sun moon worshipers

Hopefully this can cleared up into a functional setting while still remaining short.

[Bihlbo]

First of all, this is either poorly written or it's a rough draft. You decide.

You have a long way to go yet. Are you looking for help with adding things, or for feedback on the parts you have mostly fleshed out?

The Celestials are interesting. Their definition of the true way to live is slavery, apparently. Why do they build huge barns full of a well-fed breeding population that is protected from those who might steal their cattle? What do they have to gain from owning whole populations of humans? How do you plan to deal with "good" celestials treating humanity with such calous disdain?

I take it the Daimos are devil-themed creatures. It's interesting that your devils are apparently telling the truth about celestials, while the celestials are supposed to be the good ones. If the Daimos believe one should seek out the pleasures in life, but life is so hard in their lands that there is less time for leisure, who gets to succeed in their philosophy?

How do the giants define a lie? Humanity has always had a hard time understanding what truth is; how do they handle it in the lands of the giants? If the giants believe in universal/natural law, how do they feel about the value of life? They hunt, therefore the question to ask is when it is ever NOT okay to kill.

I really like the idea of using real-world philosophy to refer to the philosophy of fantasy worlds, if for no other reason than it's already defined and players might be familiar with it already. However, I confess I'm not familiar with Aristotle being associated with moderation. How do the druids handle enforcing moderation? Is it ever okay to engage in excess, or is the strictness of their philosophy the one exception to moderation? Are the druids seriously built around "druid = true neutral" and nothing else? That's dreadful. I'm already welling up with feelings I normally reserve for ewoks.

Obviously the heroics are in the "guy in armor goes here" stage, so I'll wait for you to do something with them.

[Dr_emperor]

Ok its both a rough draft and badly written.

I looking for feedback to make the parts fleshed out better. Some help with adding to the basis wouldn't be bad.

I'm planning on just repeating these power groups, with small variations, around the world instead of doing 30 little kingdoms like ebberon, forgotten realms. This is again just to make sure that my players have a clue where their characters could come from, and who the majority of the power bases are.

My one friend, Lans, is looking over my shoulder currently explaining why on a local level I need to have more detail for the other groups. I over focused on the groups that are supposed to be dominant worldwide but that doesn't matter at a local level.

I'm clarifying that since we think alignment is pretty worthless its not being used. People are going to have to decide for themselves if any of the groups are right. Each of these philosophies could have negative aspects.

I'll get to work on fleshing the rest out.

[tussock]

My goal is to couple a few distinct power groups that are leading the weak with some vague races to create a world where players can have a general idea what is going on without having to read a novel. Each of the power groups will have a religion that should be similar to a philosophy. Almost all have a benefactor that holds the scary monsters at bay.

The faerie folk (elf), full of Liberty and Love. Pirate (now with less rape).
The bringers of light (human), commanding Loyalty and Service. Feudalism.
The delvers deep (dwarf), always Building and Hoarding. Socialism.
The knife in the dark (goblin), always Scheming and Plotting. Realpolitik.
The death that waits (sahaugin), the Inevitability of the Cycles. Naturalism.

Locally? There's a large market village. A Human one. You are all in service of the local Lord, Priest, Wizard, or Master Thief (or more than one of them each). Here's your first mission: you'll be cleaning some rats of unusual size out of the local bog, where some very obvious clues to mission two, three, and four will be found. Go.


That's a campaign setting. Yours is too big. Stop adding, start subtracting. Also, Kant is a stupid poopy-head and replacing Alignment with that is bad for you. Angels, Fiends, Giants, Druids, and Lords seems fine, other than the Solar winning.